According to Zodiak, several journalists travelling in a press bus with the UTM convoy were injured.

On Thursday, Mr Chilima accused the government of trying to delay the election by deliberately allowing the spread of coronavirus after several hundred people who had returned from South Africa escaped before they could be tested for the virus.

MPs are due to meet next Friday to decide on the exact date of the election - one of the proposed dates is 23 June.

On 3 February, the Constitutional Court ordered a fresh vote be held within 150 days after annulling last year’s re-election of President Mutharika - a ruling upheld by the Supreme Court.

“People will vote in this fresh election, whether [we have] Covid-19 or Covid-21,’’ Mr Chilima had said during a campaign rally in southern Malawi.

The southern African nation currently has 203 recorded cases of coronavirus.

Football fans in Malawi push for return of the league

Peter Jegwa

Lilongwe, Malawi

AFP

Football fans
in Malawi have demanded that the local league, halted as one of the measures
to contain the Covid-19 pandemic, should resume.

Led by supporters of the country's two most followed clubs, Nyasa Big Bullets
and Be Forward Wanderers, they petitioned the Football Association
of Malawi (FAM) saying they saw no reason why football could not return while political rallies, which attract huge numbers of people, were being held by
politicians ahead of the expected 23 June presidential election re-run.

The 2020
Malawi football season was scheduled to start in March but was called off after
government banned all gatherings of more than 100 people.

The head of FAM, Walter Nyamilandu, said he was consulting relevant authorities before
deciding whether to allow the league to resume.

Posted at17:0922 May

Malawi election: What next after resignation of election chief?

Peter Jegwa

Lilongwe, Malawi

AFP

Protesters had demanded that Jane Ansah stand down

The resignation of Jane Ansah, the electoral commission boss, has divided Malawians just like their assessment of how she performed her role during last year's contested election.

The opposition and civil society groups blamed her for the irregularities that undermined the fairness of the poll that elected President Peter Mutharika for a second term. The election was however nullified by judges of the constitutional court and the Supreme Court because of irregularities.

Ms Ansah's departure should ordinarily pave the way for a new
leadership, acceptable to both sides ahead of the election expected to be held on 23 June. But in the short term it appears to have
brought more confusion than clarity.

The actual words Ms Ansah used in announcing her departure were:
“I have written to the appointing authority tendering my resignation.”

Sceptics believe the “appointing authority” - meaning President Mutharika - will choose not to accept the resignation and the saga will simply
continue.

But should President Mutharika agree there will still be more questions to answered:

Who takes over? When? and Will they have time to deliver a free, fair and credible election in
less than two months?

According to the law, the head of the electoral commission must be
a judge, nominated by the judiciary and formally appointed by the
president.

The rest of the electoral commissioners are political party
representatives, nominated by parties represented in parliament and formally
appointed to the job by the president.

As things stand, it is President Mutharika who will
have a big say about what happens next.

He may choose not to act on Ms Ansah's resignation letter or
reject it and allow the political bickering to continue, or he may choose to
accept the resignation and, accordingly engage in consultation with the
judiciary and opposition parties, to name a commission to take charge of fresh
elections.

But that still won’t guarantee the elections will be held.

The country is yet to get all the money it needs for
holding the poll at a time when it is dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ms Ansah may have announced she is departing the stage,
but Malawi's political drama is set to continue.

Posted at5:4722 May

Malawi's elections chief resigns ahead of re-run

BBC World Service

Getty Images

Protesters had demanded that Jane Ansah stand down

The head of Malawi's electoral commission has resigned a month before a presidential election re- run.

The vote was ordered by the Constitutional Court which overturned last year's poll giving a second term to President Peter Mutharika.

Protesters had demanded that Jane Ansah stand down over irregularities in the original election, including the use of correction fluid on ballot papers.

But in an interview on state television she denied she was giving in to pressure.

BreakingConfusion over Malawi re-election date

Constitutional Court judges found there had been widespread irregularities in the 21 May 2019 vote

Malawi's electoral commission says presidential
elections will not be held on 2 July, as
earlier announced.

On 3 February, the country's Constitutional Court ordered a
fresh vote be held after annulling last year’s re-election of
President Peter Mutharika.

The court said the new elections should be held within 150
days of the date of its ruling and that period elapses on 2 July - the date the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC) set
as election day.

But MEC Chair Jane Ansah has said that last Friday’s Supreme
Court judgement, which upheld the Constitutional Court's ruling, clarified that
the date for holding fresh elections should be decided by MPs - and that the 150-day
period should include the day elections results are announced.

According to electoral laws, the MEC has up to eight days to announce the results, meaning if elections
were held on 2 July, the election results would come after 150 days set by the court.

It is not yet clear when parliament will sit to decide on a new election date.

Malawians defy Covid-19 measures in election fever

Nine opposition parties have formed an alliance against President Peter Mutharika

Malawi's main political coalitions continue to defy Covid-19 prevention measures in campaigns for a fresh presidential election in July.

Huge political rallies were held over the weekend that completely defied social-distancing and mask-wearing measures hours after the country reported its highest single-day spike in confirmed coronavirus cases.

Opposition candidate Lazarus Chakwera, who has formed an alliance of nine parties, held a huge campaign rally in the northern city of Mzuzu on Sunday.

President Mutharika’s running mate, Atupele Muluzi, also addressed a huge gathering of his own on the same day in the capital, Lilongwe.

The rallies were held a day after Health Minister Jappie Mhango confirmed 13 more coronavirus cases, with five of the cases detected among health workers. The country has to date reported 57 cases and three deaths.

The Malawi Electoral
Commission (MEC) has advised political parties to seek new ways of campaigning in the wake of the pandemic, but neither of the two sides has heeded the call.

A health ministry official described the campaigns as regrettable, but said their role was limited to just prescribing measures and it was up to other arms of government,
such as the police, to enforce them.